JamesBadgeDale

(E07) "Fear and Filth" - written by Eugene Sledge while on Peleliu in description of his experience there

This week, I finally saw the value of the opening narrative with Tom Hanks interspersed with interviews with the World War II veterans. They're presented to offer background information for the events to come. Most of us have never seen anything like the war in the Pacific, so we wouldn't know about things like the intricate tunnels the Japanese used on Peleliu.

Mark your calendars and break out the martini shaker, because season 4 of AMC's critically acclaimed 'Mad Men' will debut Sun., July 25 at 10PM.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, look for last season's cliffhanger plots -- the Draper's splitting up and the disbanding of Sterling Cooper -- to be addressed immediately, making the premiere a game-changing episode.

Meanwhile, AMC also announced that its latest drama, 'Rubicon,' a conspiracy-driven show about a New York City-based government intelligence agency, will premiere Sun., Aug. 8 at 10PM. The series stars James Badge Dale and Miranda Richardson.

(E06) Part two of what I'm going to call the 'Peleliu Trilogy' offered more of what we saw with 'Peleliu Landing,' and then some. This extended look at one island campaign is to show us just how intense and long these boys were fighting for this one chunk of land, and how intense the fighting got.

(E05) Another week and another wholly different experience in the Pacific front of World War II. Whereas Guadalcanal was an island oasis, and eerily quiet when the 1st Marines landed, the island of Peleliu was a far different story. From an ocean of cannon-fire and ships to a sea of the dead, dying and injured on the beach, it was warfare from the word "Go!"

Eugene Sledge finally made it into the war, joining Leckie and company in the 1st Marines Division. He hooked up with them on the island of Pavuvu, where we left them last week. Leckie returned as well from his stay at the hospital, and they got to enjoy some wartime camaraderie before shipping out.

Sledge even got some time with his friend from back home, Sid Phillips. The care in which the producers of 'The Pacific' have given to each of these very different wartime experiences has helped to create one of the most diverse and thorough looks at war that I've ever seen.

(E04) While we were celebrating Easter, the boys in 'The Pacific' were ringing in Christmas and 1944 in somewhat less than optimal conditions. We got a brief glimpse of Eugene Sledge, finally in the marines and screwing up in training. But his story is yet to come.

With Basilone off selling war bonds and banging bar blondes, and Sledge learning the difference between "Bob" and "Tojo," it was Robert Leckie and the 1st Marines tours of duty that took center stage. And through these venues, and this Division, the writers and producers were able to showcase the psychological toll that war can have on battle-beaten soldiers.

Leckie was pretty strained already going into their tour on Gloucester, after his disastrous love affair on Melbourne. He was also on the outs with Lt. Larkin, which certainly didn't help matters on the ground.

(E01) Just as Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks collaborated with HBO in 2001 to bring us the European World War II epic 'Band of Brothers,' they've joined forces again to take us to the other side of the war with 'The Pacific.' Another ten-part series, like 'Brothers,' 'Pacific' is based on true military figures and events depicted with some dramatic license, but with attempts to be as accurate as possible.

One of the first things the production team did was establish just how different the Pacific front was from the European one. The image that dominates most dramatic presentations about the fight against the Nazi forces of Germany is the military arrival on the beaches of Normandy; a veritable trip into hell.

In contrast, the 1st Marine Regiment's arrival on the beaches of Guadalcanal is a temporary reprieve from the hell of the naval warfare going on just offshore. Everything about this first episode established the atmosphere, tension, anxiety, beauty and horrors of fighting in a tropical paradise.

Historians like to say that each new war usually finds its generals trying to re-fight the previous war. So it is with Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, who are ready to fight World War II one more time in 'The Pacific,' a 10-hour miniseries debuting March 14 on HBO.

The team that brought you 'Saving Private Ryan' on the big screen in 1998 and miniseries 'Band of Brothers' to HBO in 2001 has returned with a lavish, detailed, docudrama companion piece to 'Brothers' that promises to do for the fight against Japan what 'Ryan' and 'Brothers' did for the war in Europe: make it come alive for those of us too young to remember.

And they've spared no expense in doing so. According to the Hollywood Reporter, costs for 'The Pacific' have been estimated as high as $200 million, making it the most expensive single event in TV history. Then again, it costs a lot of money to manufacture 3,000 uniforms on 1940s-vintage sewing machines so that they'll have the right texture, or to paint 80 tons of white sand black to replicate the volcanic beachscape of Iwo Jima. That's the level of detail and authenticity the filmmakers were going for in trying to restage the Pacific war.

Read on for more of what to expect from Hanks and Spielberg's latest historical epic.